Hand held implements which are capable of selectively functioning as a vacuum or as a blower are popularly used by gardeners and by outdoor maintenance personnel. They customarily include a fractional horsepower 2 cycle gasoline engine which turns an impeller in an impeller chamber. The chamber has an intake port and an outlet port. The impeller generates an air stream that flows from the inlet port to the outlet port that can selectibly be used for blowing or for vacuuming purposes.
At the outlet port, a blower pipe can be connected to the body of the implement to direct the generated air stream to blow leaves and debris in the blower mode. For the vacuum mode, a collection bag can be attached to the body at the outlet port to receive detritus which is ingested through a vacuum pipe into the intake port and thence through the impeller chamber to the collection bag.
In the blower mode, the intake port to the impeller is suitably shrouded to protect the operator from contact with the impeller, but is adapted to permit air to enter the impeller chamber. In the vacuum mode a large diameter, elongated vacuum pipe is connected to the intake port instead. The free end of the vacuum pipe is moved along the ground to pick up detritus in the air stream which enters it, and flows through the impeller chamber, out the outlet port, and into the collection bag. The flow direction of the air stream is the same in both the blower mode and in the vacuum mode, but for each mode, different devices such as the vacuum pipe, the blower pipe, or the collection bag, are connected to the appropriate port, and they must resist the physical contacts to which they are subject.
One such arrangement is shown in Tuggle U.S. Pat. No. 4,674,146, issued Jun. 23, 1987, which patent is incorporated herein by reference for its showing of a hand held convertible vacuum/blower for these purposes. In the Tuggle device the connection of the vacuum pipe to the body of the implement is made by means of a collar which surrounds the intake port. A clamp surrounds the collar and compresses the collar against the pipe to hold it in place. A vacuum/blower with this arrangement has in fact enjoyed wide sales acceptance. However, the applicant has found that a peripheral compressive clamp is more subject to unintentional disengagement than it should be. While no harm is done if the vacuum pipe falls off in use, it is certainly an inconvenience to have to stop the implement and reassemble it. Users object to this inconvenience.
It is an object of this invention to overcome the disadvantages of the peripheral clamp joinder. In so doing it has been kept in mind that his implement must fit into an economic niche where cost and complexity of the device must be minimized.
Accordingly it is another object of this invention to provide a connector means which is expedient and economical, as well as more reliable. In fact, this connector is readily manufactured as a two-piece device in which each part is respective to either the body or the pipe, and there is no independent part to account for or to be lost or disengaged. While they are engaged they are not liable unintentionally to be separated from one another.